


Two Years Ago Now

by viv_likes_stars



Series: Vivv's Stony Christmas Fics [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety Attacks, Bruce Banner & Tony Stark Friendship, Bruce Is a Good Bro, Car Accidents, Childhood Trauma, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Fluff, Clint Barton Is a Good Bro, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, High School, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Panic Attacks, Protective Steve Rogers, Sarcasm, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Thor is a Good Bro (Marvel), Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Daddy Issues, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Has Mommy Issues, Tony Stark Has Self-Esteem Issues, Tony Stark Has Trust Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, maria starks death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:01:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28258875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viv_likes_stars/pseuds/viv_likes_stars
Summary: Tony's mum died two years ago, Christmas Eve. Is distracting himself by hanging out with Steve and company going to be enough? And when it isn't at least he has his friends to fall back on rightTW: Car accidents, Character Death,
Relationships: Steve Rogers & Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, Tony Stark & Avengers Team
Series: Vivv's Stony Christmas Fics [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2070117
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	Two Years Ago Now

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, It's Vivvy, I finally finished school for the break! Today.  
> So hopefully i can get some Xmas stuff out before the 25th! I have ideas. It's super late right now, three am! But i don't have school tomorrow! I do have to do all my shopping, I have a small family though so it shouldn't be too hard.  
> I hope you're having a fun winter! It's snowing tons here!  
> <3 Viv
> 
> TW: CAR ACCIDENTS, MINOR NON-GRAPHIC CHARACTER DEATH, ANXIETY ATTACK 
> 
> (the anxiety attack described is more of a trauma induced flashback, everyone experiences these differently, please do not assume this is un-researched)

“Tony, are you okay?”

He vaguely heard his name. December 24th. He remembered getting the call, he was hammered (at Hammer's party funnily enough) He was thirteen at the time? He’d been in grade ten at the time. After it his grades had dropped a ton, he lost all motivation in everything, which was why he was only one year ahead now. He was surprised Howard didn’t just disown him when he flunked out of sophomore year. Tony supposed emotionally Howard did. Tony’d been wearing a t-shirt she’d got him on his birthday. Random old pair of jeans, he had to throw out the crewneck he’d been wearing, every time he saw the little white embroidered words it made him want to scream, cry, punch something, all of the above.

“ _Tony can you hear me?_ ” The voice said.

“Hi, is this Tony Stark? You may want to go somewhere a little quieter so you can properly hear me”

Tony inhaled a shaky breath. He could hear the words echoing around his head endlessly.

“There has been an accident” The curt voice said simply.

  
He didn’t even have time to grab his jacket, he was nauseous the whole walk over. He’d been too out of it to even flag down a cab. By the time he’d reached the hospital his Mum was gone. He could remember her last words.

“What should I make for breakfast tomorrow?” She'd asked kindly ruffling his hair. 

And he’d replied with “why are you asking? I don’t fucking care”

It made him throw up, multiple times. Just the thought of it. He threw his scarf out into a trash bin on the side of the road after he'd gotten sick on it. His mouth had tasted like vomit for a week after. 

“ ** _Tony_** ” The voice was back. It wasn't part of the memory. It was then he was suddenly aware he was, staring at his socked feet and not his moms corpse. He looked around. Everyone was staring at him. Which probably meant he’d been zoned out for quite a bit. Luckily, he was already aware that he simply zoned out. He didn’t speak, or move around, he simply disappeared. He wondered if they knew. They probably did right? They would’ve heard about Tony Stark failing tenth grade, so they probably would’ve asked why, right? He didn't know wether or not they would've. They'd been friends since the beginning of eleventh and it hadn't come up yet, at least sober.   
  
“Hi” he said awkwardly meeting Steve’s eyes. The concern in his boyfriends eyes made his stomach flip. He wanted so badly to wrap his arms around Steve’s neck and just, cry. But he obviously couldn’t do that, for more than one reason. First and foremost, he’d never really told them that his mom had died on Christmas Eve. In his defence, he didn’t want to ruin the Christmas festivities. It always goes over great when you tell people your holiday plans are visiting your mums grave. 

‘Hey we were thinking about doing something for Christmas, what days around then are you free?’

‘Oh you know always. But I’m kind of booked up wallowing in sorrow and mourning my mother, penciled in on the twenty third to drop flowers off on her grave, and the twenty fourth is free- oh no sorry I'll be in my room crying from four am until midnight!’

So there he was sat, on the couch as the others decorated gingerbread houses. They kind of just assumed he felt the festivities were childish.

“Tones are you good?” Bruce asked stepping forwards.

“Is” he cleared his throat awkwardly “um, Rhodey- can someone get-“ Tony’s words were muttered and slurred. Rhodes, Tony needed Rhodes.

  
“He’s home tomorrow Tony, remember, he’s grabbing you in the morning from here-“ Steve whispered clearly concerned in the lapse of his memory. “He’s with his grandparents tonight” Steve continued prompting.

Tony nodded “Pepper?”

“Tones she’s at her cabin” Steve said sympathetically rubbing Tony’s shoulder. “Are you feeling alright?” He added pressing the back of his palm against Tony’s forehead. Tony nodded and Steve furrowed his brow when Tony was not warm to the touch.  
“We don’t know what’s wrong, and I’m sorry that Rhodey and Pepper can’t be here, but we’re here” Bruce said leaning against the wall.

“Should we call someone? Your dad?”

Tony looked up at Steve with a face of betrayal — even though seeing as Steve couldn’t have known, Tony had not been betrayed.  
“Don’t call him” Tony mumbled his voice cracking slightly.  
Steve nodded, they seemingly found the route of his problem. Knowing Tony’s tendency to avoid anything involving emotional vulnerability, Steve felt like it was his cue to remove him from the situation.

“Hey, I have some math homework I haven’t done yet, can you help me out with it?” Steve said awkwardly, it was clearly a lie, but Tony was thankful either way grabbing Steve’s hand and letting the blonde drag him to his bedroom, which was only a couple feet away, but the heavy door was a large enough barrier for the others.

“Tones are you okay?” Steve asked brushing his hand across the boys jawline. Tony nodded before pausing and shaking his head. Steve carefully wrapped his arms around Tony. He didn’t hug Tony as much as he would like, Tony didn’t seem to be up for much physical contact.

“It’s been two years now” Tony whispered. He felt Steve’s grasp around him tighten.

“You should’ve said something” Steve replied quietly.

“Well I didn’t” Tony snapped immediately pulling away.

“I didn’t mean it like that-“

“You sure said it like that” Tony cut him off furrowing his brow.  
“Tones-“ Steve muttered. “I just meant now I feel bad for shoving all of this” he gestured towards the door “down your throat”  
Tony shook his head “I thought it would be a good distraction” he added.  
“Do you want to talk about it?” Steve asked prompting him to sit by tugging at his wrist.  
They were perched on the end of Steve’s bed.

“Not really. Kind of? Can I stop whenever-“ Tony’s voice was quiet. Out of character. He didn’t get like this often- ever actually, this was Steve’s first real experience with Tony behaving anything similar to what was happening. They had only been dating over a month. Steve nodded grabbing his hand.

“My dad was running a red light” Tony started quietly. He’d only told this story twice before, and both were on the night that it happened between choked sobs on over the phone, Jarvis and Rhodey, in that order.

“And um” Tony swallowed awkwardly glancing at Steve before staring right back at the wall. “A car was about to T-bone them, and my dad steered himself away.” Tony said blankly. There was a lingering silence hovering around the boys. And when Tony felt as though Steve wasn’t going to speak he cut it, “I _hate_ him” Tony choked.

Steve nodded tentatively playing with his hair “Isn’t it- at least you have, uh you know Um-“ Steve had committed before he thought about what he was going to say and Tony was good at making inferences.

“ _Fuck Steve_.” Tony glared tugging his hand back away. “He steered _himself_ away. He steered my mom into the front of a car. You know I overheard the surgeons talking, they said if the car had steered in the other direction, as in the tail towards the other, it was likely nobody would have fucking died, but Howard only ever thinks about himself, and he- he _killed_ her.” Tony’s knuckles were turning white as they clutched Steve’s bedding.

Steve carefully pried his hand out of a fist before wrapping his arm around Tony.  
Tony shrugged wiping his eyes quickly, as if doing it fast enough would make the movement invisible.

“I’m so sorry” Steve whispered. He was kind of nervous. The conversation hadn’t gone incredibly but Tony was talking and that was important. And then Tony did something slightly unexpected and he rested his head on Steve’s shoulder.  
Steve carefully ran his hand through Tony’s hair. Tony mumbled something about being tired.  
“D’you wanna go to bed early? Today’s been exhausting-“ Steve said twirling his hair. Tony shook his head.

“Your sweater’s warm” Tony commented nestling into Steve’s side.

“Want it?” Steve asked smiling down at the boy. Tony nodded but didn’t make an effort to get off of the blondes neck.  
“Um, Tones” Steve added. Once again, Tony nodded. “Thanks, for talking to me, I know that was hard for you, and I’m really really proud that you did that yeah?” Steve said squirming out of his hoodie. And putting it on Tony’s lap.  
Tony smiled half-heartedly “Thank _you_ ” He replied. “Your right I should’ve said something, and it’s been like two years it’s stupid really- just-“

“Tones no-” Steve said quieting him.

“So, what are we doing? Gingerbread houses?” He smiled cocking his head towards the door.  
“You sure you don’t want to-“

“I’m not taking a nap rogers, I’m a year younger than you not a decade younger-“  
“good don’t want to go to jail” Steve smirked which got a little swat on the arm.  
“STEVE!” Tony whined as he was yanked away from the door.  
“Can’t get to the door now lame-ass can you” Steve grinned.

“You’re not even that much stronger than me-“ Tony pouted thrashing around slightly.  
“What if I held you here until you fell asleep”  
“You’d die of old age”  
“Hmm I was hoping to do that somewhere a little nicer than this, guess you’ll have to go through the door now then.”  
Tony rolled his eyes “Yeah, to get away from you” he teased. 

  
“Ah, Tony” Thor smiled tossing a bag of white icing towards the boy. Tony caught it and sat down next to Natasha.  
“Bruce your left wall collapsed again” The girl said with a very subtle amused smile.  
“Fuck!” Bruce murmured grabbing the wall of his ginger-bread house, for supposedly another time.  
“Hey! Language!” Steve teased grabbing a seat.

“Tony’s hair’s all ruffled what were you two doing in there” Clint commented with a smirk. Steve was about to send him a glare when he caught way of Tonys appreciative smile. Clint was right to tease him, it would be weird for him not too.  
Tony’s house was up in a matter of seconds, the decoration process was a little more difficult. While probably the most efficiently built with the least amount of icing and somehow still the sturdiest little house, it was the most hideously decorated thing out there.  
  
“I give up” Tony groaned as his icing-icicles broke off his icing covered roof for the twelfth time.  
  
“You know, theres nothing I hate more than quitters”

“Zola”

“Helmut”  
  
“days you can’t ~fondue~ with Tony”  
  
“When we don’t reply to your texts”

“When we’re not studying war in history class” that one earned Clint a friendly shove.  
"Okay so that gets a shove but 'fonduing with Tony goes unnoticed?"   
Steve smirked with a shrug.   
"Why am I friends with you?" he muttered.   
"I've been asking myself the same thing for four years" Natasha quipped grabbing the red sprinkles out of his hand. 

“What movie should we watch?”  
“Home alone” Thor said from his seat on the arm chair.

“A Christmas Story” Bruce offered.  
“Elf” Clint said kicking his feet onto the ottoman nailing Natasha in the back in the process.

“Move” She said with a glare, he obliged, Natasha took the arm chair and the ottoman, Clint took the ground. Steve and Tony had the right side of the couch, Bruce the left. Tony was curled into Steve’s side. He wasn’t usually so affectionate in front of the others, and Steve wasn’t complaining.  
“Home alone, Thor never gets to choose the movie” Natasha said grabbing the remote. No one could argue with Natasha, and her points were valid. 

“You cold?” Steve asked glancing down at Tony.

“No” he replied quietly nuzzling closer into Steve. Steve laughed resting his head on Tony’s.

“You doing okay?” He whispered laying a kiss on the top of the brunettes head.

Tony nodded “thanks” he replied “even if you were kind of an ass earlier”

That took Steve slightly by surprise. Had he done something wrong? Tony got like this sometimes, and usually he would get mad about backhanded comments like that, but maybe Tony was right. He started thinking about how Tony had told him about his mothers death and he’d fucking said at least you have your dad or whatever. _Who had let him believe that was a good idea?_ Jesus fuck Steve.

“Mmm I’m sorry about that” He said instead of a million protests or other things he could’ve replied with. It felt kind of good to accept he was wrong. It almost took pressure off of his shoulders. Which was strange, Steve wasn’t used to it. He was used to having to be perfect, he wasn’t supposed to screw up, but Tony never really seemed to care when he did.

“I’m glad I’m here” Tony smiled craning his neck to make eye contact. “I hate being alone for Christmas”

Steve smiled looking around the room “We all do, you know you can tell us anything. We won’t judge you”

“I wouldn’t put it past you” Tony smirked playfully.

Steve frowned slightly “seriously Tones, I’m really really sorry about that- I don’t know why I-“

“Stop I’m kidding Steve” Tony laughed “Um, I-“ Tony furrowed his brow as if he were forgetting what he was about to say.

  
“IT’S SNOWING!” Clint shrieked jumping towards the window.

A brief pause only filled with the groans of the exhausted others.

“Clint you woke me up” Bruce grumbled standing up and walking to the window his blanket covering his shoulders like a cape.  
“The flakes in Norway fall in a more light fashion you know, I think that-“  
“Thor, snow is snow, you _cannot_ argue this one” Clint replied furrowing his brow.

“Wow. It’s a Christmas Miracle. Snow in New York, in December, who would’ve thought” Natasha deadpanned glaring first at the snow and then at Clint.  
“Steve you coming?” Tony asked standing up.  
“I can see the window from here” he replied not even turning his head around to look.

“Why don’t you stop being a fucking humbug and enjoy the snow.” Tony smiled a lopsided smile as he stuck a hand out.

Steve reached for it with a dramatic groan.  
“What, your back too sore to move Oldman? Maybe we can acorn stair-lift you off of the couch-“  
“I’m _barely_ a year older than you-“ Steve glowered standing up. “Race you there” He added shoving Tony onto the couch and running around the side.

Tony appeared about ten seconds later looking slightly disheveled and mumbling something about people being immature.

“You have an advantage cause your tall, don’t let this win get to your head Rogers”  
“Maybe if you slept more and drank milk you’d be this tall”  
“Drinking plain milk is gross, I can’t believe I’ve kissed a mouth that has willingly drank plain milk”

“And you’d do it again” Steve smiled in a satisfied smirk.  
“There’s mistletoe on the ceiling” Tony replied.  
Steve looked up immediately.  
“ _Steve._ We’re at your house, how the fuck did you fall for that” Tony laughed wrapping his arms around Steve’s neck leaning in for a kiss anyways.

Steve had started leaning down but an arm stopped his face pretty quickly.

“Save the sap for the bedroom- actually please don’t we’re sleeping in there-“ Clint said a look of horror over taking his face.

“As if I’m sappy, I’m actually a playboy, according to like twenty different magazines-“  
“So you’d say you’re a swinger?”

“No I’m _the_ swinger Steve”

“Yeah, if we’re talking about swinging both ways” Natasha snorted, Tony broke away and laughed, a genuine, eyes closed mouth opened laugh, he rested a hand on Nat’s shoulder.

“That was actually really fucking funny, or maybe Steve’s just lowered my standards for what I find humorous” Tony replied.

“It was the latter Mr. Womanizer”

“Oh god what have I started”

“You tell me Romeo”

“Fuck you all” Tony pouted.  
“I didn’t do anything!” Thor protested.

“Yeah you know what your right, you got me in the soft spot Odinson” 

T’was the night before Christmas, and all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. They were all asleep on the ground in Steve’s room. Except like everyone, nobody was sleeping. They were all whispering, because _have you ever been to a sleepover_.

  
“You were saying something what was it?” Steve said rolling over slightly. Steve and Tony had claimed a mattress on the ground, Bruce and Clint were sharing the bed, and Natasha and Thor were on the sleeping mats. It was a cycle. A pretty unfair one because usually Nat would take the bed no matter what.

“Huh? Oh yeah, my least favourite Christmas movie is Shrek the Halls and I have an argument to back this up-“  
“Tony, no before that, it sounded serious”

“Oh, that-“

Steve could’ve sworn a blush was dusting the boys cheeks.  
“I, was just you know thinking” Tony bit his lip. “I was looking at your stupid smile and I thought ‘I love you’ and I wanted to say it, but it felt really rushed maybe I don’t know- but um, I do- I think- if that’s not freaking you out- shit- um, but yeah-“  
“I love you too Tony” Steve replied laying a light kiss on his jawline.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Leave a comment with anything you'd like to see  
> <3 Vivv


End file.
